Who was the real St Patrick?

Those who wish
to pay homage to St Patrick on 17 March could attend a parade, don an outlandish
green costume or swig a pint (or several – twice as much Guinness worldwide is
consumed on St Patrick’s Day than on any other day of the year). An alternative
way to celebrate the saint's legacy, however, is far more peaceful and
spectacular: visiting the sites where he brought Christianity to Ireland – including
mighty hilltops, vast mountains and exquisite alpine lakes.

Facts about
Patrick's life and work are as misty as Ireland's mountains, and they’re mingled
(or mangled) with folklore and legend. Scholars generally believe that he was
born sometime around 373 AD in Roman Britain. As a 16-year-old, Patrick (Patricius
in Latin) was captured by Irish raiders and sold as a slave to a druid (a Celtic
priest) in today’s County Antrim in Northern Ireland, though the exact location
is unknown. For the next six years, he toiled as a shepherd, developed his spirituality
through prayer and became fluent in Irish.

According to his autobiographical letter
Confessio, thought to have been written around 450 AD and first published in
the early 9th Century (the Book of Amagh, containing the earliest copy believed
to exist, is in the Library of Trinity
College, Dublin), an angel appeared in a dream urging him to flee from his
enslavement. After being reunited with his family in Britain, he had a divine calling
to the priesthood. He trained in France and returned to Ireland as a missionary
in about 433 AD.

At the time, the
Hill
of Tara, located 43km north of Dublin in fertile County Meath, was the ceremonial
capital of the High Kings. They practised Celtic paganism and believed Tara to
be both the dwelling place of the gods and the gateway to the Otherworld. Today
the hill, a vast green expanse rising 197m with sweeping vistas of the surrounding countryside, remains a
palpably sacred site with a wealth of remains including a
Stone Age passage tomb (a narrow passage made of large stones containing
multiple burial chambers) and prehistoric burial mounds up to 5,000 years old.
The Heritage Ireland information centre runs 40-minute guided tours of the site
and screens a 20-minute film entitled Tara, A Royal Sanctuary about the area’s impact
on Ireland's Celtic history.

While it's not known when Patrick first visited Tara,
he certainly saw the High Kings' power base across the valley
not long after his return to Ireland. While Celtic
festival fires were burning on Tara, the High Kings forbid other fires in the
area. But Patrick defied convention, lighting a paschal (Easter) fire on the Hill of
Slane, near today's village of Slane, located about 16km northeast of Tara.
From the Hill of Tara, you can see the Hill of Slane across the valley on a
clear day. High King Laoghaire and his attendants (including Erc, who later was
baptised as a Christian and would become the first bishop of Slane shortly
thereafter) went to confront the interloper. According to legend, Patrick plucked
a shamrock from the ground, using its three leaves (and his Irish language
skills) to explain the Church’s paradox of the Holy Trinity: the union of the
Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit in one. Convinced by the stranger, Laoghaire
agreed to let Patrick continue his missionary work. The weathered, silvery stone
ruins scattered across the grassy, 158m-high Hill of Slane today include a
foundational outline of a church, a round tower and a monastery associated with
St Erc, and a later Norman motte and bailey on the hill's western side, built
by Archembald Fleming, who came to Ireland with Henry II in 1171. Every year on
Holy Saturday (the Saturday before Easter), the local parish priest lights a
fire on the Hill of Slane in Patrick's honour.

Patrick's accomplishments
at Slane marked only the beginning of his missionary career. He headed to
another significant Celtic site, the Rock of Cashel,
in the town of Cashel, County Tipperary, about 94km north of Cork, which then rivalled
Tara as a centre of power in Ireland. It was here that Patrick is said to have baptised
Aengus, the son of the King of Munster, in the mid-5th Century. The Rock is
still sometimes referred to as St Patrick's Rock. Edged by jagged limestone
outcrops, it rises from the plains just outside the town of Cashel. Its walls enclose
a still-intact 12th-century round tower, 13th-century Gothic
cathedral and exquisite 12th-century Romanesque chapel. In the courtyard, the
stone St Patrick's cross replicates the worn original in the Rock of Cashel's 15th-century
Hall of the Vicars Choral, which was built to house the cathedral's male
choristers.

Ireland's “holiest
mountain”, Croagh Patrick, aka “The
Reek” — a soaring 765m-high, conical mountain near Westport, County Mayo — was
already a place of Celtic pilgrimage to celebrate the beginning of the harvest
season when Patrick arrived. Around 441 BC, he reputedly took a 40km route from
County Mayo’s Ballintubber Abbey
to Croagh Patrick via the pathway Tóchar Phádraig (Patrick’s Causeway), and
fasted atop the mountain for 40 days and nights during Lent. On the last Sunday
of July (Reek Sunday), devout pilgrims follow his original route, traditionally
without shoes. Mass is celebrated at the modern-day chapel at the top of the
mountain. Otherwise, any time of year, hikers can start the two-hour climb from
the base of the mountain to the summit in the village of Murrisk, next to the
visitor centre Teach na Miasa. The
views over picturesque Clew Bay, which is dotted with 365 islands, are
dazzling, especially at sunset. Those less trekking-inclined can contemplate
Croagh Patrick aboard an idyllic cruise around the bay with companies such as Clewbay Cruises, whose 90-minute
cruises also take in seal colonies and unspoilt sand dunes.

Croagh Patrick
is just one of several places where St Patrick is famously claimed to have
banished snakes from Ireland, chasing them into the sea during his mountaintop fast.
Another is the Serpent’s Lake, in the Gap of Dunloe. Located just outside of Killarney National Park in County
Kerry, the lake is where Patrick is alleged to have tricked and imprisoned the
last of Ireland’s snakes in a chest – then thrown the them into the waters. The
Gap — a glorious mountain pass with crystal-clear streams, rugged peaks and wildflowers
— is best explored by walking, cycling, or, most atmospherically, jaunting car
(horse and cart) with entertaining commentary from a jarvey (driver). At the
northern end, the landmark 19th-century pub Kate Kearney's Cottage, still owned by Kate Kearney’s descendants, is a
great resource for information on the area. (Of course, it is now widely
accepted that there never were any snakes in Ireland in the first place, and
that the legends surrounding Patrick's exploits are symbolic of eliminating
pagan culture.)

Patrick spent some
30 years spreading the Gospel and founding churches and monasteries, eventually
becoming the first bishop of Armagh, Primate of All Ireland toward the end of
his life. He retired to what is now County Down, where it is believed he died in
461 AD on 17 March — hence his feast day — in Downpatrick. He is said to be
buried in the grounds of the 12th-century Down Cathedral.

Below St
Patrick's alleged burial site, the enlightening, highly interactive Saint Patrick Centre is the only
dedicated exhibition centre in the world dedicated to Ireland's patron saint.
The centre makes an ideal starting — or ending — point for discovering other St
Patrick sites throughout the Emerald Isle.